NCC arrests 75 agents running illegal Sim cards registration

National Communications Commission (NCC), said it has arrested 75 agents operating Sim Card registration for engaging in fraudulent practices.

Five of the agents were apprehended in Minna, will the remaining 70 were arrested in other states in the North Central and South West regions of the country.

The NCC Head of Enforcement, Mr. Efosa Idehen, disclosed this on Wednesday after the arrest of five agents who engage in fraudulent registration of Sim cards in Minna.

He accused the arrested agents of pre-registering and selling registered and fully activated Sim cards to the customers.

Idehen further said the mop-up of agents into illegal Sim cards registration will be extended to other parts of the country in the next six weeks.

According to him, ‘’agents of fraudulent Sim cards registration have no where to run as the Commission already have the details of everyone and we have been trailing and monitoring these agents since 2012’’.

He disclosed that five out of identified six suspects had been picked up in Minna, Niger state capital lamenting that some of the agents had more than one machine with them.

“Today, we came to Minna trailing six lined for three mobile operators. One of the operators, MTN had three lines while Airtel had one and Glo had two machines. The operators fully coperated with us as they brought the agents to their office where they were arrested. We learnt that some agents had machines from each network.”

The Head of Enforcement then pleaded with Nigerians to allow the registration process work the way it was planned to work stressing that if it works, it will go a long way in being able to track up criminals, help for research purpose and help NCC in having a clean and organized database.